


Science Bros Before Hos

by Kris



Category: Marvel (Movies)
Genre: Crack, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-05
Updated: 2014-03-05
Packaged: 2018-01-14 15:23:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1271455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kris/pseuds/Kris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Steve was really Tony's BBF he would stop cornering Tony in strange places to have awkward conversations about safety and bruises and safe words</p><p>(this was a chat fic I wrote for Pandorablu, it's basically crack)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Science Bros Before Hos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pandorablu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pandorablu/gifts).



If Steve was really Tony's BBF he would stop cornering Tony in strange places to have awkward conversations about safety and bruises and safe words.

"Look, I know that this Century can be a little confusing, I realize you were frozen for a really long time and that things these days are not what they were in your days, but I think you're a bit confused as to what "Safeword" means now and I really don't suggest you Google it, it might hurt your brain." Steve stares at Tony with his big ‘for America’ eyes and a concerned tilt to his mouth.

"Tony, I just, I want you to know that if this is all too much to handle you can talk to me about it, I might not really...get...what you're doing but seriously, anytime, my door is always open." Tony looks over at Steve's door, which is literally closed right now. “Okay, you get what I mean," Steve says. Tony’s not so sure he does. 

“I'm not sure I actually understand this conversation" Tony admits, and this is like the fourth time Steve has cornered him to have this conversation. “I think we've got some sort of cross generational verb confusion going on.” Steve looks pointedly at Tony's bruised arm. Tony frowns. “What this? Dummy knocked a wrench off the workbench."

"Right, I'm just saying. I'm here, you know, if you need me." Tony walks away from that conversation with the strangest feeling that he may have just been propositioned by Captain America to have kinky sex. For once in his life though, he is so incredibly unsure that he's not even going to follow up. He vaguely wonders if this is what the rest of the world feels like when they try to hook up. But seriously, Tony doesn’t even want to hook up with Steve. Kinky or not, that would be way too much like having sex with his dad. Tony shudders just thinking about it.

"Jarvis,” Tony calls out. “Could you schedule me a visit with my Therapist? I think the bad thoughts are coming back."

"You don't have a therapist, Sir." Right, Tony's just going to have to soldier on, oh god no, Tony's got to go back down to the lab and work until he doesn't think about skin tight star spangle banner'ed soldiers anymore. He finds Bruce and they work in the Lab until Bruce succumbs to the need for sleep.

***

Working by himself in the lab doesn’t really distract him the way he wants it to and instead, Tony does what he does during any confusing point in his life, he calls Pepper. Maybe he could have started the conversation off a little better, not opened with "I don't think your crush on Captain America is going to work out to your benefit, I just thought you should know."

"Tony, it's like 2 o'clock in the morning, do you really need me right now?"

"No, in fact, I'm saving you some trouble, Steve, he's into some really strange things...like safeword's and maybe bruises and I think you should..." the dial tone is strangely comforting. 

***

The pamphlet he receives with his morning pot of coffee is not comforting at all. Not in the least because it is slid across the table in the Denny’s down the block from the tower at ass o’clock in the morning by Thor while the wait staff try to take cell phone pictures of them and Thor explains to him in all seriousness that the television has informed him that breakfast was the most important meal of the Midgardian day even though on Asgard the most important meal of the day is clearly the feast held after battle to celebrate the victory. They’re in a Denny’s because Thor has a thing for the skillets. Thor has a concerned look on his face and Tony has a sinking feeling in his gut.

"Are you trying to tell me something?" Tony asks and Thor says "Captain Rogers has asked me to give this to you". Tony glares at the pamphlet with the sad, shadowy door outline, the bright light behind it, the inside text full of Ariel Black headers like **help is available** and italicized Papyrus statements that say _I didn't really fall down a set of stairs, he hit me and it's not okay and I'm leaving him_. Tony is so confused, he literally has no idea what’s going on. He checks his phone three times in a row praying that there’s a text from Bruce so he can get out of here.

"Look, I think Steve is trying to pull a practical joke, and he's not very good at it, just ignore him okay?” Thor doesn't really care any longer anyway as the food's arrives.

”These Skillets are ingenious" he says and Tony tries not to grimace at the amount of grease that plate is swimming in. He figures that Steve's attempt at sad practical jokes has fallen to the wayside when no one bothers him for like a month. It's awesome. Tony gets shit done. Okay, so he rebuilds the thrusters in war machine for Rhody and then maybe he spends some time screwing the internet around until Bruce comes in and distracts him with SCIENCE and it's a glorious month.

***

Natasha corners him by the pool, by which Tony means he was totally ogling Natasha sun bathing by the pool, but he was doing it in the open because otherwise he's pretty sure she, and Barton would kick his ass...maybe Coulson would too, because Coulson kind of glares at anyone who looks at Natasha sideways. Tony honestly doesn't spend a lot of time thinking about that particular threesome...hardly anytime..okay they're like top five, max. The point being that Natasha, when wet and in a teeny weeny bikini corners him at the poolside bar, Tony is unable to do anything but stand frozen in fear. Fear of the fact that water conducts electricity and Coulson carries a tazer everywhere not fear of the 100 lb girl in a bikini obviously, because he can totally take Natasha. Again, obviously.

"Banner is my friend," she says. Tony is confused once more.

“Yeah, Bruce is my pal too," he says. She makes this impatient sound and tosses her hair in a way that makes Tony horny and terrified at the same time.

“I'm saying that everyone might be worried about you, but I'm more worried about him.” 

“We're not like, recreating his gamma ray accident or anything, he's totally not into that no matter how many times I ask.” Tony reassures her. The whole tower has gone insane. He’s going to get Coulson to hire therapists, lots of therapists.

"You're an ass” she snaps and now she's glaring and isn't this just par for his life.

"Yes, okay, I'm sorry?"

“You will be," is tossed over her shoulder at him as she stomps off.

Later, sitting on the couch beside Bruce while they play Mario Kart on the Wii Tony will complain and Bruce will pat him on the shoulder and he will say "I'm sure she's just trying to be a good friend, don't take it too personally." Then, when Tony thinks it's water under the bridge, Bruce will throw a banana peel at his car and ask him "do you know why Steve keeps shoving domestic abuse pamphlets under my door?” and Tony will drive Yoshi off Rainbow Bridge.

Things get pretty quiet on the Avengers front, no real baddies pop up for months and Tony's life falls into a not-so bad pattern he gets up, works on stuff in his lab, pisses off Pepper, pisses off Fury, pisses off Coulson. He has lunch with Bruce and then pisses Coulson off some more while Bruce is around mainly because Coulson won’t threaten to taze him when Bruce is around, chickenshit. One day, over lunch with Pepper, she mentions to him that she is completely astonished that he hasn't managed to destroy his current relationship and she's impressed with the lack of self-sabotage which is about the time Tony realizes he's no longer dating Pepper.

"We're not dating anymore, are we?" he asks (later on, after everything, even he is surprised she doesn't punch him in the face for that one).

"No Tony, we're not dating anymore, we haven't been dating for about three months now.”

"Huh," he thinks maybe he should fix that, and has vague plans formulating to send her some roses, maybe some chocolate.

"Don't send me roses, Tony" she says, because she could always read his mind, can. "You don't have to fix this." A thought comes to him and he catches her elbow as she tries to leave.

"You're not really into Steve right? you're not the reason there's a bunch of domestic abuse pamphlets everywhere? it's not some cry for help?” (later, after everything, he'll be insulted about the way she sits down at the table and laughs and laugh and laughs until she's crying.) Three days (three months) after his disastrous break up with Pepper they finally get a bad guy. Doom bots trudging through the streets of New York, tearing up the place. They’re really easy to take down, but the lasers are a pain, especially when one of them hits him it's really, really painful. Bruce is all hulked up and sulking on the edge of a building freaking out the public because he can't smash anything with the way the Doom bots all fall over after a while and then explode. The fight is over really before it starts which doesn't make Tony any less confused about his life and now he's sporting a semi from all the adrenaline and Bruce is still all hulked up and the rest of the Avengers are looking at him like this is Tony's problem. Okay fine. 

“Hey, Big Green!" Tony bellows, flies up to where Hulk is climbing along the side of the building, oblivious to the terrified faces of the office workers inside. Hulk stops climbing the office building and starts trying to bat Tony out of the air. "Come on, man, I downloaded a copy of the Princess and the Frog, you're going to love it" even Tony is surprised that the promise of a Disney movie works but Hulk hops off the side of the building and gamely follows Tony back to the tower.

By the time Bruce is Brucely again, the rest of the team have all made their way back and Tony is getting a tub of ice cream out of the freezer when the rest of the Avengers all pile into the kitchen. Everyone is giving his bruises a weird look and Tony frowns back at them. He doesn’t ogle their laser created bruises.

"Are you okay?" Clint asks and he doesn't even sound douchey doing it. Tony shrugs and digs spoons out of a drawer "They're just bruises man, nothing to worry about.”

Tony decides that there's obviously something he's missing when he comes across a container of Clint's homemade bruise cream sitting on his desk. He pokes at it from a distance for a while to make sure it's not booby trapped, last week Clint had scared the bejesus out of Tony by hanging around on top of a door frame like some weird cat person and then jumping at him. The point here being that booby traps in the tower are an actual concern! and Jarvis can defrag himself if he thinks Tony's being crazy. The bruise cream is kind of awesome though, it's soothing and cool and honestly takes care of the bruises in a couple of days and Tony takes a sample to find out what's in it but then he changes his mind because for some real reason, he doesn’t want to know.

Tony ends up at a benefit without Pepper a few days later (Bruise free!) and two hours in he's chatting up a girl at the bar and is happy that this isn't going to be one of those events where he wants desperately to skip out of but he knows Pepper is totally going to kill him if he doesn't stay. She's pretty hot, long brown hair, pretty brown eyes and a smirk on her face that says she knows what he's trying to get from her and she might allow it. Tony's all for it and he's about to order another drink when his phone buzzes. He ignores it, but whoever it is sends him eight texts in a row and when he looks it over he realizes its Bruce and Bruce has new Ideas and Ideas are Tony's achilles heel. The chick wasn't that hot anyway and she's kind glaring now that he's playing with his phone instead of her. Tony checks the time, smiles at her and says "sorry, my lab assistant needs me.” She makes a pouting little hmpfing sound that Tony would bet sounds totally awesome when she's in bed and it distracts him until Bruce sends another text. Tony blinks because Bruce is sending him some really, really hot science and he's powerless against it.

"You know what, this has been fun," he says and he really should learn not to science and people at the same time because the next words out of his mouth are "but I gotta go, science bros before hos, you know?' and he leaves. Pepper barely keeps that one down to three gossip rags and a fruit basket. 

It's during the whole debacle of angry benefit lady that Tony finally gets cornered by Coulson. They're in an elevator and Coulson stares at him like Tony's the dumbest thing ever to dumb but that's normal for Coulson and just when Tony has finally had enough, Coulson interrupts the heavy silence.

"You shouldn't cheat on Banner, it's a douchey thing to do but also, it’s Banner and I don't want to clean that up.” and finally, it's like a lightbulb goes off in Tony's head. Of course, then he does become the dumbest thing to ever dumb when he says "Wait, what? oh god, I'm dating Bruce" and Coulson smirks and says "Fury owes me twenty bucks, he didn't think you were really that emotionally retarded." Tony would reply but he's too busy being stunned stupid. Tony isn’t going to look but he can tell that Coulson is laughing at him. Okay that would be because Coulson is actually laughing at him, the asshole is wiping a tear away from the corner of his eye. When the elevator doors open Coulson takes a deep breath and then his serious face is back up and he points at Tony.

“No, seriously, don't cheat on Banner again, it's a douchey thing to do and if he goes green and kills us all because you forgot you were dating him I'll make sure you get it the hardest." The doors close on Tony before he realizes that a) that was his floor and b) that threat didn't make sense. Fucking Coulson. Tony takes the elevator back down to his lab and then from there broods in the silence that loud punk music provides him. 

He's listening to Sid Vicious whine about drugs and sex when it finally occurs to him that he's in a real, monogamous, relationship with Bruce Banner of all people. They hang out when they're not working, he watches Disney movies with him and they make popcorn and they go out for dinner. Okay, they don't actually leave but Tony orders really expensive not-really-take-out-but-he-is-a-rich-asshole food and they have picnics in the back yard and no one bothers them. And he's always concerned about the bruises that Tony comes home with and oh...suddenly the last few months make so much sense.

"Jarvis, how long have I been dating Bruce Banner?" Tony asks.

"I'm unsure if you were dating Dr. Banner when he was not living in the manor" Jarvis says, because Jarvis is an asshole. Tony would know, he programmed him that way. 

"Do you think that he knows we're dating?"

"Do you want me to find that Therapist now, Sir?" Jarvis asks instead, Tony regrets programming all the sass.

When he finds Bruce in the yard at their table with food laid out and god, they have a standing dinner/picnic date on Friday's Tony realizes. He can't help blurting the first thing on his mind, namely "Did you know we've been in a monogamous relationship for like, six months, and we haven't even had sex yet?" for about ten seconds Tony's worried Bruce is going to Hulk out and squish him and then he realizes that's not what's going to happen when Bruce furrows his brow in that adorable confused way of his.

"Oh good," Tony says, 'You're confused too."

“I thought we were just taking it slow, you've been remarkably considerate" Tony didn't used to be this clueless. No really. What even is his life right now?

"No, really, I didn't used to be this clueless, give me some kind of hand here, do you actually like me?” There's a quiet moment and Bruce sighs and puts down his fork and stands up from the table.

"Wait, are we breaking up now?" Tony asks and he's completely filled with panic because he didn't know they were doing this and now he doesn't know if they're still doing this, and if they're not doing this Tony is going to be really bummed and Bruce might _leave_ and Coulson is definitely going to taze his ass so hard. Bruce just shakes his head and he's got this fond looking smile on his face and he takes Tony's hand and drags him back to the house.

"Yes, Tony, we're still doing this,” Bruce says. And wow, do they ever. Like wow. 

And then three weeks later, Tony is digging in the freezer for the Chunky Monkey, a spoon hanging from his mouth and a spoon in his hand when Clint, Natasha and Coulson come piling into the kitchen and Clint gasps and Natasha says "Jesus Tony, are you okay?" and Tony realizes that a) he's not wearing his shirt and b) Bruce really likes the biting thing. Tony really likes the biting thing too.

"I can appreciate what this looks like," Tony says, "and it's totally what it looks like.” 

"Are you at least..." Tony points his spoon at Coulson's face.

“If I get even one more domestic abuse pamphlet I'm telling Fury about your little menage a trois and you can bet I'm telling him about the cuffs I found in the laundry room" Clint, amazingly enough, blushes like he's a fire truck.

THE END


End file.
